You have probably heard of Area 51. That desolate expanse of desert somewhere out west where UFO's are alleged to have be spotted. I have news for the UFO seekers out there. If it is UFO's you are looking for, then you don't need to look any further than the corner of the closet in my sewing room. I have my own personal Area 51. It's been years in the making. It has history, drama, unidentified patterns, unusual shapes, odd forms, coupled with all the thrill of a nice clean archeological dig.
Much like the U.S government, I have been denying the existence of these UFO's for years. Our recent household move forced me to recon with the UFO pile that had accumulated over 25+ years. I had to stop lying to myself that I was going to "finish that later".
The first chore was to get all of those abandon projects in one place and admit to myself what I had. That was eye opening! Doing my best to channel Marie Kondo, I sorted, subdivided and purged the piles - THREE times to pare it down to what you see here. (I don't normally subscribe to Marie Kondo and her "Does it bring you joy" organizational methods. I have a mountain of scrap fabrics that most people would toss out and every single piece brings me joy. I also have a kitchen full of small appliances and pots and pans which don't even make me smile, but I'm pretty sure I have to keep them.)
What is left in my personal Area 51 is what I feel is a reasonable representation of pieces, parts and half finished projects that I can see myself completing or putting to good use.... at some point. After all, some of the UFO's in my stash simply need binding. They are "finished" quilts. It's just that they aren't "done". (If you are reading this and you don't understand that there is a difference between finished and done, have a quilter explain it to you).
I had nothing so solid as a "plan" for the mountain of bits and pieces that exist in Area 51. I simply could not part with things like baggies filled 17 batik Nine Patch blocks and a 4" stack of squares to make more. Or the 2" finished quarter square triangles that represented the possibility of an amazing Ohio Star quilt, or not. The nine out of 12 completed blocks from a 10 year old mystery project, that wouldn't take much more to complete. Or the mountain of corner clips that only needed to be sewn together, pressed, and then squared to some reasonable size before they would make a great start on a whole new project. I couldn't possibly trash those.
Now I am back to work in my new sewing room. I am busy writing programs for quilt shops across the US and Canada. That process requires that I design, make, and write the patterns for multiple projects. Quite often in the design process a project takes a turn and my original idea is trashed. I was working on a new block of the month using copious amounts of half square triangles when size became a problem. Then remembered those clipped corners in the UFO stash!
A bit of digging, sorting and restacking and I pulled out those waste triangles. They have been in that UFO stash sewn together and pressed for so long, waiting for their chance to shine that I can't even remember the project they originally came from! A bit of squaring up and ta-da enough scrappy half square triangle units for 12 different pieced blocks with a stack to spare. I even have a beautiful batik to use with them. Marie Kondo be damned. Vindication for scrap hoarders everywhere!
Now to figure out what to do with the original HST in the wrong size......
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